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I have read Book 1 this week. At last I have opted for Merry (thanks, Paul ), which I must say I have found very useful, specially the short Homeric grammar that is appended at the end of the book. I am glad because I have solved most of my morphological questions, better understood the many uses of the participles, and felt that, finally, the imperfect vs aorist makes sense. However, there are still some things left out, like the perfect tense (many of the questions that I make below have to do with the perfect), and of course the seemingly unending vocabulary is still the first hurdle in the reading.One more about this last thing: at first, when I started reading from Merry, I missed the short vocabularies with which books like S&H accompany the passages with the most frequent words that are worth memorizing, but then I found out that looking at the dictionary each time can be much more pedagogic (well... with a computer at least, and when one has mastered the core vocabulary). So here goes a tip (probably most of you already know it, but maybe helps anyone): to determine which words are worth remembering I use the frequency analysis tables of Perseus for the Odyssey, I just find each word in the table, and if the frequency is above certain limit I add the word to my memorization list, otherwise I just write down the word at the margin with a short definition.That said, here are some questions that I couldn't solve with Merry's notes:

It seems like a concession: wishing to see his earth, even if it were only it's smoke. The sense is clear, but, what is the smoke of the earth? Is there any metaphorical use of the word that I am missing here?

1) I would expect a coma after ἐποτρύνω. That way "καὶ οἱ μένος ἐν φρέσὶ θείω" would be parenthetical, and then ἐποτρύνω would be with the infinitive clause that follows. Would you explain the infinitive clause in any other way?

μνηστῆρες, τοῖσιν μὲν ἐνὶ φρεσὶν ἄλλα μεμήλει,

It seems that is common to use μέλω in the perfect/pluperfect tense, but I still don't get it. Which would be the difference in meaning if I replace μεμήλει for ἐμέλησε in this sentence?

How would you explain that (ἀπ)ὄλλυμι is perfect the first time, but aorist the second?I would translate:"On the contrary, he has died an evil death, and there is no hope to us, even if a man upon the earth should say that he is coming: his day of return has been lost."I don't see any grammatical difference between the first "died" and the second "lost".So, my question is: would the sentence result in exactly the same meaning if I interchange these two verbs? Are metrical reasons and variety the only factors here?

I would expect ἐγώ in the accussative (if it has to be expressed at all), since this is an infinitive construction.

267,400:

ἀλλ᾽ ἦ τοι μὲν ταῦτα θεῶν ἐν γούνασι κεῖται,

This is a strange expression, I would expect things to be in the hands of the gods, not in their knees! Have you got any theory about it? Maybe means that something depends of the prayings of the mortals (for to pray to someone implies to be at his knees)?

274:

μνηστῆρας μὲν ἐπὶ σφέτερα σκίδνασθαι ἄνωχθι,

How should I take ἐπὶ σφέτερα? "On their own"? Or ἐπὶ σφέτερα [δώματα]?

Really I don't see the imperfect of πρίαμαι here, I would expect the aorist. Hebought her, and to buy something is nothing durative, right?Note: below I listed this verb as one of which I couldn't explain the form (it is a μι deponent verb, so I would expect πρίετο to be the imperfect, not πρίατο), so I suspect that maybe this is actually a first aorist, not an imperfect, despite what the lemmatizer of Perseus says.

435:

φιλέεσκε καὶ ἔτρεφε

I wonder when is the iterative form used and when is not. I mean, there are manycases where the action is frequentative and the iterative form is not used (herefor example, is used in the first verb and neglected in the second, being bothverbs grammatically equal in the sentence and having a very close meaning). Isthis just arbitrary or is there any other condition besides the frequentativeaspect of the action that makes more probably the apparition of an iterativeform? How would you explain this case particularly?

Before I start with Book 2, I would like to listen a reading of what I have read, would you recommend any audio resource to me? I am not very ambitious really, I just would like to recite to myself less or more decently what I read.

ἐποτρύνω καί οἱ μένος ἐν φρεσὶ θείω -- the infinitive goes with both verbs: "urge him and put the strength in his chest/mind to summon the Achaeans into the market-place and denounce the suitors ..."

μεμήλει -- You have to accept that Homer uses the perf./pluperf. forms of this verb with a present/imperfect meaning (this is true of many other perfects, as well, such as κεχρημένον, above). Don't forget that Homeric diction is a highly artificial, formulaic language that incorporates various dialects and periods, not always consistently.

ἀπόλωλε/ὤλετο -- ἀπόλωλε means not just that he died but that he is dead, like τέθνηκε. ὤλετο simply reports an event.

ἀλλ᾽ ἦ τοι μὲν ταῦτα θεῶν ἐν γούνασι κεῖται -- "lies in the lap of the gods". Greek idioms are not necessarily the same as English or Spanish idioms. Just note the expression and move on. Picture a larger than life seated statue of Zeus. The image is more vivid for us perhaps than it would have been for the ancient Greeks, just as "in the hands of the gods" has lost most of its graphic impact.

ἐπὶ σφέτερα - ἐπὶ σφέτερα [δώματα]

That's all I have time for right now.

Last edited by Qimmik on Fri May 09, 2014 3:00 pm, edited 1 time in total.

With regard to the perfect: many times the father of Telemachus is referred as πατρὸς οἰχομένοιο (1.281, 1.135), with a present participle, when I would expect a perfect one. I just point it out, because it seems to me like the inverse situation that I have with μέλω.I have been thinking about it: the sense of a verb can refer sometimes to something stative (like be absent or gone), and others to something dynamic (like to go away or depart). By default, i.e. in the present, a verb inherently refers to either something either stative or dynamic: for example, μέλω refers to a dynamic action, say "I put something in my mind as a concern". But when I conjugate the verb I can change it's aspect, and a verb that is dynamic in the present becomes stative in the perfect. Then, in the perfect we have that "I have put something in my mind as a concern" = "I concern about something". And there is the "perfect with present sense". On the other hand, a verb that denotes something stative in the present, like οἴχομαι ("to be gone"), can be used in the present "with a perfect sense", like in the case of πατρὸς οἰχομένοιο (although this isn't a good example, because I checked in LSG and it seems that οἴχομαι is used with a dynamic sense too by Homer, and then it has also a perfect form).The troublesome I suppose, is that a stative action that is expressed in one language by a present with a stative meaning, may be expressed in the other with a verb that is dynamic in the present but becomes stative being conjugated in the perfect. So, one can think in terms of "presents with perfect senses" and "perfects with present senses". Just a think. I am trying to make sense of this.

Infinitives in -μεναι are generally Aeolic. These forms may coexist with Attic-Ionic forms because the Homeric language incorporates words and forms from multiple dialects and multiple periods of the Greek language. See Smyth 469 D:

Smyth writes: "Hom. has no case of -εναι (for ἰέναι write ἴμεναι)." Well, in Od. 1.374 we have the form ἐξιέναι, and there is no evidence in the manuscripts of a variant reading ἐξιμεναι. Generally, Aeolic forms were replaced in the Homeric diction by Ionic forms where this was possible metrically. In most cases it would have been metrically impossible to replace Aeolic infinitives in -μεναι by Ionic infinitives, but in the case of ἐξιέναι/ἐξιέμεναι, the meter would have allowed replacement, so I think Smyth is wrong.

Addendum: I see that Chantraine, Gram. Hom. I, sec. 234 reaches the same conclusion as I did about ἐξιέναι.

Both the poem and the song are nice indeed, I didn't know either. I have a five CD box of Brassens, "les plus belles chansons", and it doesn't even have this song! But he was prolific. Looking at the song titles in the collection I notice that there are some others by him with Homeric themes. I haven't listened to him for a while and mostly remember him for the naughty bits... The end of this great song is particularly memorable!